How Miami revealed Piastri’s greatest threat; rivals’ worst fears come to life: Talking Pts 

‘That’s obvious, isn’t it?’ Norris in testy exchange as star fumes over Max controversy

‘Got the edge’: Piastri move that sealed ‘unbelievable’ win as Norris dealt harsh truth

‘Wretched luck’: Doohan crashes out in brutal moment as $17m twist in F1 future emerges

PIASTRI BOUNCES BACK TO MAKE MORE HISTORY

Victory in Miami was Piastri’s third in succession and fourth in five grands prix, making him the undisputed form driver of the competition.

He’s the first Australian in 46 years to win three grands prix in a row. The previous was Alan Jones, who won the German, Austrian and Dutch grands prix consecutively in 1979.

Only Jack Brabham has won more races in succession among Australian drivers.

Piastri is the first McLaren driver to win three consecutive races since Mika Häkkinen in 1997–98 and the first to do so in a single season since Ayrton Senna in 1991.

It’s the first time McLaren has won three consecutive races since Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button split the Hungarian, Belgian and Italian grands prix in 2012.

His championship lead has grown to 16 points over Norris, a 39-point turnaround in the five weekends since the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

But the history-making elements of Piastri’s victory are arguably the least important.

In the story of his 2025 title tilt, the way he won it matters more.

“I think this weekend was not my best,” he said. “A lot of that was yesterday [in qualifying].

“I think the race today was pretty solid, but I think yesterday I was pretty frustrated with my performance.

“Ultimately I won the race this weekend, but I think the likelihood of winning many races qualifying fourth is pretty low.

“It felt like I did a lot of things right today.”

To bounce back from a scrappy qualifying performance that delivered his worst grid spot of the season is what this chapter of his championship campaign will be remembered for.

They say titles are won on your bad weekends. If this was a bad weekend for Piastri, then he’s set for a very good season.

NORRIS UPBEAT DESPITE DEFEAT

Lando Norris has been on an emotional rollercoaster this year as he grapples with the challenge of Piastri’s big step up and occasional competitive cameos from Max Verstappen, but despite missing pole, being beaten at the start and finishing second to his teammate this weekend, he left Miami looking relatively upbeat.

“It was good fun,” he said of his race. “It was enjoyable. I never wanted to let Oscar get too far out of my sights, but I had to put up a good challenge in the first quarter or third of the race trying to get past the Mercedes, trying to get past the Williams, trying to get past Max — not an easy start for sure, but I made my way through reasonably quickly.”

But the wash-up of his race boiled down to one moment: the first lap.

Norris got a good enough start to pressure Verstappen into the right-handed first corner, where the Dutchman locked up and ran wide. Norris judged the situation well and undercut him on the inside line, and they ran side by side into the left-handed turn 2.

Now Norris was on the outside, but he had the momentum and was beginning to nose ahead.

Then Verstappen hip-and-shouldered him off the road and into the damp run-off area. After scrambling to keep control of his car, Norris rejoined the race sixth, precipitating his fightback.

He eventually caught and passed Verstappen, but by then Piastri had amassed an almost 10-second advantage Norris would never be able to close.

Debate after the race therefore centred on whether Norris had been wise to challenge Verstappen so strongly on the first lap given his pace advantage.

“In hindsight it would’ve been potentially wiser of Lando just to lift and accept that he would’ve gained the lead later on in the race because the car was fast enough,” Stella told Sky Sports. “But that’s with the benefit of hindsight.”

Hindsight is the important element there, because it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which, on lap one of a race, a driver in Norris’s position doesn’t attempt to pull off that pass.

Verstappen had made a mistake and put himself in a vulnerable position. Norris was slightly ahead as they approached the second turn. It would be practically unheard of for a driver to drop anchors and effectively hand back first place rather than attempting to keep the pressure on, especially considering the value of clean air this season.

It was also a small snap of oversteer that triggered Verstappen to bump him off the road rather than a deliberate action. Had Verstappen kept control of his car as expected, Norris may well have pulled off the move. At worst he would’ve conceded second place later down the road.

“What can I say? If I don’t go for it, people complain. If I go for it, people complain, so you can’t win,” Norris said. “But it’s the way it is with Max — it’s ‘crash or don’t pass’ unless you get it really right and you put him in the perfect position.

“But I paid the price for not doing a good enough job today, but I’m still happy with second.”

Norris eventually got past Verstappen, though it took him longer than it perhaps should have — and it wouldn’t be the first time the Briton has left himself open to criticism that his racecraft lacks the ultimate edge, particularly against the Dutchman, who has bested him so often.

But he got his own back with a concluding dig after the race, noting the time Verstappen wasted fighting a losing battle with the McLaren drivers exacted a higher cost than just first or second place.

“He ruined his own race,” Norris said. “He’s not racing very smart.

“He probably could’ve finished third today, but he didn’t because of that. He’s fighting hard, as is always expected, but that’s the way it is.”

Clearly it’s not just Piastri who’s revelling in having such a quick car.

McLAREN’S TURNAROUND STUNS RIVALS

This was the sort of race McLaren’s rivals have been fearing — total domination.

It’s been clear McLaren’s car has been comfortably fastest of the field in race trim, even if its drivers have struggled to always get the most out of it in qualifying.

It’s won plenty of races, but it had been yet to put in the kind of performance that truly blows the other frontrunners away in a way that would make them wonder whether catching up this season is a possibility.

Miami was that performance.

On the hottest circuit of the season and around a mixed layout that meant none of its rivals was consistently competitive, the MCL39 obliterated the field, delivering by far the largest victory margin over the next-best team of the season to date.

McLaren’s victory margins, 2025

Australia: 0.895 seconds

China: 11.097 seconds

Japan: defeated by 1.423 seconds

Bahrain: 15.499 seconds

Saudi Arabia: 2.843 seconds

Miami: 37.644 seconds

McLaren’s margin was more than twice as large as it was in Bahrain. Combined with its one-two in the sprint, the team took away the maximum 58-point haul for the weekend.

“That’s quite a margin,” McLaren boss Andrea Stella reflected to Sky Sports. “Well done to Oscar and Lando for exploiting the performance we have available in the car, especially in hot conditions. It looks like our race pace is definitely very strong.

“Well done once again to the team that designed, produced, conceived and delivered this formidable car.

“We keep going, we keep building, but it was a very positive day.”

But more telling than the maximum score and the crushing margin was the scale of McLaren’s improvement.

The Miami Grand Prix was one of McLaren’s lowest moments in 2023, Piastri’s first year. While work was going on at the factory on an upgrade package it hoped would resuscitate its fortunes, at the track the team was mercilessly pummelled in an embarrassing display for one of the sport’s great constructors.

McLaren in Miami, 2023

Highest grid spot: 16th place

Best qualifying margin: 1.553 seconds off pole (1.031 seconds slower than fastest Q1)

Best race result: 17th place

Smallest race margin: 87.717 seconds behind the winner (14.856 seconds slower than next worst car)

Compare those results to this weekend’s headline statistics.

McLaren in Miami, 2025

Highest grid spot: 2nd place

Best qualifying margin: 0.065 seconds off pole

Best race result: victory

Smallest race margin: 37.644 seconds ahead of next-best car

“I remember two years ago here in Miami we were genuinely the slowest team,” Piastri said. “To now have won the grand prix by over 35 seconds to third is an unbelievable result.

“It’s just incredible, the hard work that’s gone in … every single person, firstly the people here at the track but everyone back at the factory as well.”

Not every circuit will be this favourable for McLaren, but with an advantage of 105 points in the constructors standings, with the car having been at least competitive at every circuit and with major rule changes looming next year, Miami was the sort of result that could have rivals wondering whether 2025 is worth any more effort and resource.

FERRARI COMPOUNDS LACK OF PACE WITH TEAM ORDERS DRAMA

There was a long stretch in the first stint of the grand prix during which Charles Leclerc couldn’t pass Alex Albon’s Williams and Lewis Hamilton couldn’t break through Esteban Ocon’s Haas.

It was a remarkable indictment on the team’s lack of competitiveness this weekend, all of which it spent cut off from the frontrunning teams it expected to be rivalling for the title this season.

Hamilton eventually got past Ocon, but neither he nor Leclerc could get past Albon. Ferrari ended the weekend having been the fifth fastest car in qualifying and the race.

But it managed to make that situation even worse with a completely unnecessary team orders drama in the second stint that laid bare the troubles facing the team this season.

Ferrari split its strategies, with Leclerc starting with the expected mediums from eighth and Hamilton starting with hards from 12th. It meant Hamilton would have the quicker tyre on lighter fuel in the final stint.

The timing of the virtual safety cars meant he emerged from his pit stop close behind Leclerc, both in pursuit of Antonelli for sixth place.

He soon began pressuring to be let through over team radio.

The team initially rebuffed the request, and Hamilton grew increasingly vociferous that his strategy gamble was being wasted stuck behind the sister car on slower tyres.

“This is not good teamwork,” he said, reminding the team that he’d let Leclerc through on his own volition in China in a similar situation.

Eventually the pit wall relented — “Have a tea break while you’re at it,” Hamilton said sarcastically about the slowness of the call — putting him ahead of Leclerc on lap 38.

But Leclerc immediately started complaining that Hamilton wasn’t pulling away as his medium tyres began expiring, and 14 laps later Ferrari switched them back.

They never caught Antonelli.

Often forgotten is that a team order costs time. It’s faster than a drawn-out battle, but it’s not cost neutral.

Ferrari lost 0.2 seconds to Antonelli with its first team order and then half a second to the Mercedes driver with its second swap.

That’s 0.7 seconds lost in a battle Antonelli won by 1.5 seconds.

Team boss Fred Vasseur was right to say afterwards that there’s always a question about whether the following driver is genuinely quicker or just quicker because they’re getting the benefit of DRS in justifying the slow call.

It’s not scientific, but when Leclerc was the lead car, he closed on Antonelli by around 0.3 seconds per lap on average. Hamilton took more like 0.23 seconds per lap during his stint as the leading Ferrari.

Antonelli led Leclerc by 6.2 seconds at the end of lap 34, the lap before Ferrari made its first swap.

Had he taken 0.3 seconds out of Antonelli for every lap to the chequered flag, he would have finished 0.7 seconds ahead.

Of course Antonelli could well have defended the place, but the crude maths suggests Leclerc would have got himself within DRS for the last five or so laps, giving himself a chance.

Instead neither Ferrari ever got within a second of the Mercedes.

“It’s obvious today was not the way we want to manage a race,” Leclerc said. “We’ll discuss internally in order to make better decisions.

“There are no bad feelings for Lewis, absolutely not, it’s just that as a team we need to do better, and today was proof of that.”

Between a lack of pace and a lack of operational sharpness — and Hamilton’s ongoing struggles, even if he was competitive in race trim and in the sprint — Miami showed up everything that’s wrong with Ferrari in 2025 as its deeply disappointing season took a fresh negative turn.